Tag Archives: Fox News

Excellent detailed piece on Sarah Palin by journalist Michael Joseph Gross in the October 2010 issue of Vanity Fair …

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Sarah Palin: The Sound and the Fury

Former Republican Vice Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin speaks at the "Restoring Honor" rally at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington on August 28, 2010.

Even as Sarah Palin’s public voice grows louder, she has become increasingly secretive, walling herself off from old friends and associates, and attempting to enforce silence from those around her. Following the former Alaska governor’s road show, the author delves into the surreal new world Palin now inhabits—a place of fear, anger, and illusion, which has swallowed up the engaging, small-town hockey mom and her family—and the sadness she has left in her wake.

Tea Partiers & Birthers continue to claim their Tea Party movement is not based on racism, dispute all the evidence to the contrary.

I was going to open this piece with an analogy about the tea party groups and why they’re treated seriously by the press and the Republicans. The analogy would go something like: “Imagine [insert left-wing activist group here] getting a serious profile in a mainstream newspaper, and imagine serious Democratic politicians appearing at their convention.”

The problem is, when I really evaluated what the various far-left activist groups are all about and compared them with the tea party movement, there really wasn’t any equivalency. At all.

Because when you strip away all of the rage, all of the nonsensical loud noises and all of the contradictions, all that’s left is race. The tea party is almost entirely about race, and there’s no comparative group on the left that’s similarly motivated by bigotry, ignorance and racial hatred.

I hasten to note that I’m taking about real racism, insofar as it’s impossible for the majority race — the 70 percent white majority — to be on the receiving end of racism. That is unless white males, for example, are suddenly an oppressed racial demographic. But judging by the racial composition of, say, the Senate or AM talk radio or the cast members playing the Obamas on SNL, I don’t think white people have anything to worry about.

This isn’t an epiphany by any stretch. From the beginning, with their witch doctor imagery, watermelon agitprop and Curious George effigies, the wingnut right has been dying to blurt out, as Lee Atwater famously said, “nigger, nigger, nigger!”

But they can’t.

Strike that. Correction. TeaParty.org founder Dale Robertson brandished a sign with the (misspelled) word “niggar.” So they’re not even as restrained as the generally unstrung Atwater anymore.

No Joke - Sarah Palin has a guest spot in a new right-wing conservative children's book entitled "Help! Mom! Radicals Are Ruining My Country"

Are you blue as a mandrill’s buttocks because you missed the chance on Friday to grab that 60″ flat screen TV on sale at Mallwart for the kids’ playroom? Bummed because your neighbors finally encrytped their broadband router and you couldn’t snag all those Cyber Monday bargains offered online today? Do you even know the difference between xbox, PS3, and mp3?

Folks, it’s never too early to “learn yer kids” about how to drape themselves in reactionary jingoism and drown themselves in rank ignorance and failed business models. No, we’re not talking about buying them Going Rogue at the bargain bin price of $4.97, nosiree. Complete with cartoony versions of Democratic Party leadership, Help! Mom! Radicals Are Ruining My Country!by some crazy named Katharine DeBrecht (hmm, sounds . . . foreign) is a paean not just to exclamation points, but to the regurgitation of every conservative wingnut talking point that has slimed its way into the public discourse over the past year through our good friends at FOX News.

Fox News host Glenn Beck put to rest any rumors of one possible “dream ticket” team for 2012: Palin-Beck. On his radio show Thursday, Beck said he was “absolutely” ruling out the possibility of running for office with the ex-governor at the top of the ticket. His proffered reason: Palin would always be “yapping,” like they were “in the kitchen.”

Earlier in the week Palin said that she was open to the idea of pairing up with Beck. Palin told Fox News she “got a kick” out of the idea of them running together. She went on cheerfully, “He probably thought it was just a hoot too. I don’t know, we’ll see.” Palin told Newsmax she could “envision a couple of different combinations, if ever I were to be in a position to really even seriously consider running for anything in the future, and I’m not there yet.” She added: “But Glenn Beck I have great respect for. He’s a hoot.”

It looks like the respect might not be mutual. From the morning’s radio show:

BECK: I don’t think things are hoots. I don’t. I don’t think it’s a hoot. I would never use the word hoot, and I respectfully ask that every time my name is brought up she would stop using the word ‘hoot.’ […]No, no I’m just saying — Beck-Palin, I’ll consider. But Palin-Beck — can you imagine, can you imagine what an administration with the two of us would be like? What? Come on! She’d be yapping or something, and I’d say, “I’m sorry, why am I hearing your voice? I’m not in the kitchen.”

At last the American right and left have one issue they unequivocally agree on: You don’t actually have to read Sarah Palin’s book to have an opinion about it. Last Sunday Liz Cheney praised “Going Rogue” as “well-written” on Fox News even though, by her own account, she had sampled only “parts” of it. On Tuesday, Ana Marie Cox, a correspondent for Air America, belittled the book in The Washington Post while confessing that she couldn’t claim to have “completely” read it.

“Going Rogue” will hardly be the first best seller embraced by millions for talismanic rather than literary ends. And I am not recommending that others follow my example and slog through its 400-plus pages, especially since its supposed revelations have been picked through 24/7 for a week. But sometimes I wonder if anyone has read all of what Palin would call the “dang” thing. Some of the book’s most illuminating tics have been mentioned barely — if at all — by either its fans or foes. Palin is far and away the most important brand in American politics after Barack Obama, and attention must be paid. Those who wishfully think her 15 minutes are up are deluding themselves.

The book’s biggest surprise is Palin’s wide-eyed infatuation with show-business celebrities. You get nearly as much face time with Tina Fey and the cast of “Saturday Night Live” in “Going Rogue” as you do with John McCain. We learn how happy Palin was to receive calls from Bono and Warren Beatty “to share ideas and insights.” We wade through star-struck lists of campaign cameos by Robert Duvall, Jon Voight (who “blew us away”), Naomi Judd, Gary Sinise and Kelsey Grammer, among many others. Then there are the acknowledgments at the book’s end, where Palin reveals that her intimacy with media stars is such that she can air-kiss them on a first-name basis, from Greta to Laura to Rush.

But even a friendly interview can be treacherous. In a sit-down with Fox News’ Sean Hannity Wednesday night, the former Alaska governor confused Iraq and Iran several times.

Watch: :

Asked about how to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons, Palin responded by suggesting we get tough with Iraq.

“We have allies who are as concerned about Ahmadinejad’s actions as we are,” she said. “Cutting off the imports into Iraq, of their refined petroleum products. They’re reliant … on those imports. We have some control over there. And some of the beneficial international monetary deals that Iraq benefits from, we can start implementing some sanctions there and start really shaking things up and telling Ahmadinejad, nobody is going to stand for this.”

By the look of Fox News‘ video footage, one would think that Sarah Palin‘s new book “Going Rogue” was in such demand, it was drawing tens of thousands of people into overcrowded book stores.

That’s because on Wednesday, the network showed 2008 footage of Sarah Palin on the campaign trail while discussing the “huge crowds” who were attending her book tour.

Fox has since made the following statement:

“This was a production error in which the copy editor changed a script and didn’t alert the control room to update the video,” said Michael Clemente, senior vice president of news at FOX.

This new oversight comes off the heels of Jon Stewart of “The Daily Show” calling out Sean Hannity for running video in September of a hugely attended Tea Party protest in Washington. At the time, however, Hannity was discussing a far less attended rally that took place in early November.

Below, watch videos of both Fox News flaps. Is this a simple accident or a troubling trend?